Sunday, April 5, 2015

NBA Defensive Player of the Year

Draymond will check a point guard.

Your eyes can fool you when it comes to defense. A steal or a blocked shot catch the eye, and are among the traditional statistics tracked and published. In most cases, a steal or a blocked shot is a good thing. However, if a player gambles for a steal, and misses, (as many of the steals leaders do), the TEAM defense is now playing four against five. Likewise, a shot may be attempted to be blocked, which leads to an opening for the opponent on the offensive glass. Taking a charge is STILL not a statistic that shows up in the NBA box-score. (You can find charges taken total at http://www.nbaminer.com/player-foul-details/). So, what IS the best way to measure defense? That is a tough question, not easily answered. The "Defensive Rating" stat is our preferred method these days. Defensive Rating measures the number of points scored by the opponent per 100 possessions when any given player is on the floor. Recently, I heard someone in the NBA, whom I respect, say that LeBron James was the best defender out of the group of MVP candidates (Stephen Curry, Anthony Davis, James Harden, and Russell Westbrook). That declaration struck me. While LeBron is a freak, and I would have no issue riding with him for a single defensive possession, there are now measurables that go deeper than just a single possession, that suggest there are better choices than LeBron. Modern statistical advances now allow us to tabulate how many points the opponent scores on EVERY possession that LeBron, or ANY OTHER player is on the floor. In any one game a single NBA team will average roughly 98 possessions. The Defensive Rating makes it impossible for a player to "take a play off" without it being tracked. Other subtleties that used to go unnoticed include a player who draws technical fouls and gives free points to the opponent in the form of technical free throws. The Defensive Rating tracks all these nuances.

No ole'. Defensive Rating catches you.

The issue with using Defensive Rating as the "be all, end all" is that all individual Defensive Ratings are subject to who your four other teammates are. Backline defenders who play with slower, poor, defensive guards, will allow more points per 100 possessions than backline defenders who play, with say, a ball-pressure hawk like Patrick Beverley. Guards who play with great rim protectors (like Rudy Gobert) will see their Defensive Ratings improve. If a guard plays with an undersized center, the guard's defensive rating can suffer. The way around some of this confusion is to look at the team's defensive rating and see what players individually are above or below their own team average. All of the above prefacing is simply to help non hardcore basketball fans understand how difficult it can be to measure defense, which is rarely highlighted but remains HALF of the game. To decide on the NBA Defensive Player of the Year, we looked at four key defensive statistics, and ranked 20 potential candidates. The 20 players comprised any who ranked in the top five in one of the four categories plus others known as great defenders (Marc Gasol, Tony Allen, LeBron, Nerlens Noel, Russell Westbrook). We assigned points in each category (Defensive Rating 50%, Charges Taken 20%, Steals 15%, Blocked Shots 15%). Our method crowned Draymond Green the 2014-15 NBA Defensive Player of the Year. The versatile forward checks perimeter players or BIGs. He has anchored the Warriors defense all season. When Green is on the floor the Warriors give up just 97 points per 100 possessions. The team as a whole has a Defensive Rating of 100.7 which is the best of the 30 teams in the NBA. Our top five NBA defenders of 2014-15? Green, followed Bogut, Noel, Leonard, and Gobert. As for LeBron... In our study, he ranked only ahead of Westbrook when it comes to the five players most mentioned in the MVP race. (If you are curious, in our defensive study, Curry edged Davis, followed by Harden, then LeBron, then Westbrook.)(You can see how each of the 20 D.P.o.Y. candidates ranked in each category below.)Blocked shots (total) (15% weight)Anthony Davis 183Rudy Gobert 174DeAndre Jordan 171Serge Ibaka 155Nerlens Noel 140Tim Duncan 137Marc Gasol 125DeMarcus Cousins 103Andrew Bogut 100Draymond Green 94James Harden 56Kawhi Leonard 46LeBron James 46Marreese Speights 34Tony Allen 30Monta Ellis 24Stephen Curry 16Russell Westbrook 14Chris Paul 13Kyle Lowry 12Charges Taken (20% weight)DeMarcus Cousins 34Monta Ellis 28Marreese Speights 28Kyle Lowry 25Steph Curry 12Draymond Green 11Marc Gasol 8Russell Westbrook 6LeBron James 4Andrew Bogut 3James Harden 3Nerlens Noel 3Chris Paul 2Anthony Davis 1Rudy Gobert 1Tim Duncan 0Kawhi Leonard 0Serge Ibaka 0DeAndre Jordan 0Tony Allen 0Defensive Rating (50% weight)Andrew Bogut 96Draymond Green 96.5Kawhi Leonard 96.6Tim Duncan 97.2Rudy Gobert 98Tony Allen 98.4Nerlens Noel 98.5DeAndre Jordan 99Marc Gasol 99.7Anthony Davis 100.2DeMarcus Cousins 100.8Stephen Curry 101James Harden 102Marreese Speights 102Serge Ibaka 103LeBron James 105Chris Paul 105Monta Ellis 107Russell Westbrook 107Kyle Lowry 108Steals (total) (15%)Stephen Curry 151 Chris Paul 147Monta Ellis 145James Harden 144 Nerlens Noel 131Tony Allen 129Kawhi Leonard 129Russell Westbrook 129Draymond Green 117LeBron James 102Kyle Lowry 102Anthony Davis 90DeMarcus Cousins 89DeAndre Jordan 73Marc Gasol 67Rudy Gobert 58Tim Duncan 56Andrew Bogut 38Serge Ibaka 30Marreese Speights 16